‘Yellowjackets’ Season 3, Episode 7 Recap: ‘Barbecue’

Season 3, Episode 7: ‘Croak’

R.I.P. Edwin. We hardly knew you.

The timid herpetologist (Nelson Franklin) who finds the Yellowjackets dancing by the fire in their cannibalistic ritual meets a quick end this week.

Almost immediately after his cheery greeting — followed by his revulsion upon discovering Ben’s decapitated noggin — Lottie creeps up behind him and whacks him in the back of the head with a hatchet. That’s what the Wilderness wants, she declares. All the other Yellowjackets are rightfully upset. Finally, they have contact with the outside world, and she immediately goes and murders someone? What gives?

But Edwin wasn’t the only visitor to the Yellowjackets camp. He arrived with two other souls who end up in the Yellowjackets’ custody: His girlfriend and fellow scientist, Hannah (Ashley Sutton), and their guide, the mysterious loner Kodiak (Joel McHale, even more sardonic and surly than usual). If the end of Episode 6 was a thrilling tease, Episode 7 is the confirmation that “Yellowjackets” is moving its plot forward both in the past and the present.

All of that revolves around the arrival of these new figures, whom we’re introduced to in a prologue of sorts that begins three days before they meet our deranged soccer team. Edwin and Hannah are deep in the woods studying the mating habits of “Arctic banshee frogs.” The hilariously-named Kodiak is their guide.

Hannah is intrigued and somewhat aroused by Kodiak. Edwin is deeply suspicious of him. One night, after smelling what he thinks is “barbecue,” Edwin goes wandering off looking for other souls in this forest. He finds the Yellowjackets.

He instantly dies thanks to Lottie. Kodiak shoots Melissa with one of his arrows and he and Hannah start running, pursued by our girls and Travis with torches. Their hunt for Kodiak and Hannah has a double purpose. On one hand, they can’t leave any witnesses behind; on the other, they need people to get back to civilization.

What the teens don’t know, at least at first, is that the scientists’ satellite phone is broken, meaning their presence does not imply instant rescue. The three newcomers got high the night before and, while horsing around, wrecked the lifeline.

Tai and Van are the two Yellowjackets to discover this fact as they snoop around their new not-so-pleasant acquaintances camp. It’s a moment that drives home a feeling that has been missing from recent episodes: These are still just lost teenagers who miss their families. Van’s reaction upon seeing the phone, before realizing it doesn’t work, is: “I’m going to try my mom.”

It’s a small line of dialogue that strikes a deep chord. For so long, these girls have been playing dress up, dealing with their circumstances by acting like adults out of necessity. They’ve blocked out the memories of their loved ones as a coping mechanism.

But if their plane had not crashed, they would be living at home. Sure, they’re high school existence might still be filled with drama, but at the end of each day (most of them) could go to their parents for advice or comfort. The heartbreak in Liv Hewson’s face is painful to watch. Despite that tough exterior, she is still a child, deep down.

Motherhood is a quiet theme running throughout this episode, especially as we learn the contents of the tape that Adult Shauna received in the present day. It’s a recording Hannah made that documents not only Edwin’s killing and the subsequent events but also a message she left for her child.

Even though it’s clear that Hannah ends up spending some time with the Yellowjackets, Shauna and the other survivors never knew she had a daughter as a teenager. Now, Shauna believes it’s Hannah’s kid who is a threat. Shauna, for someone who lost a baby in her youth, is glib about parenthood, and at this point potentially all other human connections.

As she embarks on her road trip to Virginia to confront Hannah’s offspring, she tells Jeff that Callie needs to back off, using an expletive that does not make her mother of the year. And it’s not as if she were transferring any of her maternal energy toward her pals. Her cruelty toward Misty reaches new heights in this episode. Yes, Misty — who tags along on the road trip with Tai and Van — accuses Shauna of murder; the DNA sample she collected from Lottie’s fingernails matches the hair Walter plucked from Shauna’s head. But Shauna still treats Misty with a callous disregard, even in a moment of crisis. The journey goes quickly awry when Adult Van spits up blood.

As Adult Van lies, possibly dying, in a hospital room somewhere in the middle of nowhere, Shauna offers no waiting room consolations. Instead, she ditches Misty and the rest of her former teammates to confront Hannah’s daughter, knife in hand, all by herself. This was a Shauna forged by her trauma: If the child she had as a teen died, so can the one Hannah had.

Shauna believes she can be the arbiter of death for others. Meanwhile, Adult Van is negotiating for her own life. From her grown-up perspective, she sees a vision of the teenage Van, that girl who just wanted to talk to her mom, setting her adult self’s bed on fire. But Adult Tai is also there — the evil version of Tai, mouth coated in black goo — who promises Van she can help her survive.

But Van doesn’t want that kind of salvation. She has already witnessed it too many times.

More to chew on

“Who wants to go halfsies on some floss picks?” is a great Misty-ism.
I am unconvinced Shauna actually killed Lottie.
Nice Cocteau Twins music cue at the end there.
Shoving the arrow through Melissa’s shoulder was pretty gnarly.
Lottie’s casual attempt to help after coating herself in Edwin’s blood was grimly funny.
Kodiak mentions “the Wilderness.” Is this the same Wilderness that the Yellowjackets pray to? What does he know?